Some arrangements of particles feel better than others. Why?
We have no general theories, only descriptive observations within the context of the vertebrate brain, about what produces pain and pleasure. It seems like there's a mystery here, a general principle to uncover.
Let's try to chart the mystery. I think we should, in theory, be able to answer the following questions:
(1) What are the necessary and sufficient properties for a thought to be pleasurable?
(2) What are the characteristic mathematics of a painful thought?
(3) If we wanted to create an artificial neural network-based mind (i.e., using neurons, but not slavishly patterned after a mammalian brain) that could experience bliss, what would the important design parameters be?
(4) If we wanted to create an AGI whose nominal reward signal coincided with visceral happiness -- how would we do that?
(5) If we wanted to ensure an uploaded mind could feel visceral pleasure of the same kind a non-uploaded mind can, how could we check that?
(6) If we wanted to fill the universe with computronium and maximize hedons, what algorithm would we run on it?
(7) If we met an alien life-form, how could we tell if it was suffering?
It seems to me these are all empirical questions that should have empirical answers. But we don't seem to have much for hand-holds which can give us a starting point.
Where would *you* start on answering these questions? Which ones are good questions, and which ones are aren't? And if you think certain questions aren't good, could you offer some you think are?
As suggested by shminux, here's some research I believe is indicative of the state of the literature (though this falls quite short of a full literature review):
Tononi's IIT seems relevant, though it only addresses consciousness and explicitly avoids valence. Max Tegmark has a formal generalization of IIT which he claims should apply to non-neural substrates. And although Tegmark doesn't address valence either, he posted a recent paper on arxiv noting that there *is* a mystery here, and that it seems topical for FAI research.
Current models of emotion based on brain architecture and neurochemicals (e.g., EMOCON) are somewhat relevant, though ultimately correlative or merely descriptive, and seem to have little universalization potential.
There's also a great deal of quality literature about specific correlates of pain and happiness- e.g., Building a neuroscience of pleasure and well-being and An fMRI-Based Neurologic Signature of Physical Pain. Luke covers Berridge's research in his post, The Neuroscience of Pleasure. Short version: 'liking', 'wanting', and 'learning' are all handled by different systems in the brain. Opioids within very small regions of the brain seem to induce the 'liking' response; elsewhere in the brain, opioids only produce 'wanting'. We don't know how or why yet. This sort of research constrains a general principle, but doesn't really hint toward one.
In short, there's plenty of research around the topic, but it's focused exclusively on humans/mammals/vertebrates: our evolved adaptations, our emotional systems, and our architectural quirks. Nothing on general or universal principles that would address any of (1)-(7). There is interesting information-theoretic / patternist work being done, but it's highly concentrated around consciousness research.
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Bottom line: there seems to be a critically important general principle as to what makes certain arrangements of particles innately preferable to others, and we don't know what it is. Exciting!
We seem to be talking past each other, to some degree. To clarify, my six questions were chosen to illustrate how much we don't know about the mathematics and science behind psychological valence. I tried to have all of them point at this concept, each from a slightly different angle. Perhaps you interpret them as 'disguised queries' because you thought my intent was other than to seek clarity about how to speak about this general topic of valence, particularly outside the narrow context of the human brain?
I am not trying to "Learn how to manipulate people? Learn how to torture? Become a pleasure delivery professional?" -- my focus is entirely on speaking about psychological valence in clear terms, illustrating that there's much we don't know, and make the case that there are empirical questions about the topic that don't seem to have empirical answers. Also, in very tentative terms, to express the personal belief that a clear theory on exactly what states of affairs are necessary and sufficient for creating pain and pleasure may have some applicability to FAI/AGI topics (e.g., under what conditions can simulated people feel pain?).
I did not find 'necessary and sufficient', or any permutation thereof, in the human's guide to words. Perhaps you'd care to explicate why you didn't care for my usage?
Re: (3) and (4), I'm certain we're not speaking of the same things. I recall Eliezer writing about how creating pleasure isn't as simple as defining a 'pleasure variable' and incrementing it:
I can do that on my macbook pro; it does not create pleasure.
There exist AGIs in design space that have the capacity to (viscerally) feel pleasure, much like humans do. There exist AGIs in design space with a well-defined reward channel. I'm asking: what principles can we use to construct an AGI which feels visceral pleasure when (and only when) its reward channel is activated? If you believe this is trivial, we are not communicating successfully.
I'm afraid we may not share common understandings (or vocabulary) on many important concepts, and I'm picking up a rather aggressive and patronizing vibe, but a genuine thanks for taking the time to type out your comment, and especially the intent in linking that which you linked. I will try not to violate too many community norms here.
I'm not nyan_sandwich, but here is what I believe to be his point about asking for necessary and sufficient conditions.
Part of your question (maybe not all) appears to be: how should we define "pleasure"?
Aside from precise technical definitions ("an abelian group is a set A together with a function from AxA to A, such that ..."), the meaning of a word is hardly ever* accurately given by any necessary-and-sufficient conditions that can be stated explicitly in a reasonable amount of space, because that just isn't the way human minds work... (read more)